Nurse and patient characteristics associated with duration of nurse talk during patient encounters in ICU.

BACKGROUND: Communication interactions between nurses and mechanically ventilated patients in the intensive care unit (ICU) are typically brief. Factors associated with length of nurses' communication have not been explored.
OBJECTIVE: To examine the association between nurse and patient characteristics and duration of nurse talk.
METHODS: In this secondary analysis, we calculated duration of nurse talk in the first 3-min of video-recorded communication observation sessions for each nurse-patient dyad (n = 89) in the SPEACS study (4 observation sessions/dyad, n = 356). In addition, we explored the association between nurses' characteristics (age, gender, credentials, nursing experience, and critical care experience) and patients' characteristics (age, gender, race, education, delirium, agitation-sedation, severity of illness, level of consciousness, prior intubation history, days intubated prior to study enrollment, and type of intubation) on duration of nurse talk during the 3-min interaction observation.
RESULTS: Duration of nurse talk ranged from 0-123 s and varied significantly over the 4 observation sessions (p = .007). Averaging the duration of nurse talk over the observation sessions, differences in talk time between the units varied significantly by study group (p < .001). Talk duration was negatively associated with a Glasgow Coma Scale ≤14 (p = .008). Length of intubation prior to study enrollment had a curvilinear relationship with talking duration (linear p = .002, quadratic p = .013); the point of inflection was at 23 days. Nurse characteristics were not significantly related to duration of nurse talk.
CONCLUSION: Length of time the patient is intubated, and the patient's level of consciousness may influence duration of nurse communication in ICU.

RCT Entities:   Population Interventions Outcomes